reducing disparities in the treatment of hypertension using the owl mhealth tool

Conditions: Hypertension

Summary: this is a one-year study. the study's primary outcome is successful improvement of the our whole lives for hypertension (owl-h) online patient education platform, based upon participant use and focus group feedback, to deliver information on self-management of hypertension and other cardiac risk factors, and to encourage self-monitoring of blood pressure. specific aim 1 - to pilot test the owl-h platform for 8 weeks with 26 patients with hypertension (2 groups of 13) to refine its utility for home self-monitoring (number of times patients record home blood pressure and input this data onto owl-h and engagement of self-management (i.e. # of logins, # of mind body sessions completed, # of times modules accessed each day)). hypothesis 1: eighty percent of patients will log in and record their blood pressures. specific aim 2 - at the end of each group, hold a focus group to obtain information about: 1) the barriers and facilitators of using the owl-h platform and using owl-h to self-monitor blood pressure at home, 2) satisfaction with owl-h, 3) how owl-h helped with reduction of number of cardiac risk factors (e.g., smoking, eating habits, perceived stress, and amount of exercise and health-related quality of life).

this is a one-year pre post clinical study. the study's primary outcome is successful improvement of the our whole lives for hypertension (owl-h) online patient education platform, based upon participant use and focus group feedback, to deliver information on self-management of hypertension and other cardiac risk factors, and to encourage self-monitoring of blood pressure. we piloted online owl-h platform for 8 weeks with 26 patients with hypertension to refine its utility for home self-monitoring. we also held a focus group to obtain information about: 1) the barriers and facilitators of using the owl-h platform and using owl-h to self-monitor blood pressure at home, 2) satisfaction with owl-h, 3) how owl-h helped with reduction of number of cardiac risk factors

Eligibility criteria:
inclusion criteria: * male and female subjects of all races and ethnicities who are english-speaking adults over the age of 18 and who have a current diagnosis of hypertension.. owl in currently only available in english. * subjects' physical and mental health status will be sufficient to be able to comprehend instructions and participate in the interventions. * subjects must be able to access computer technology (cellular phone, desktop, laptop) and the internet to utilize the online owl-h. exclusion criteria: * serious underlying systemic or co-morbid disease, including psychotic or manic symptoms, which preclude physical or cognitive ability to participate in the intervention. the risk-benefit ratio of the interventions for these individuals may be potentially higher than acceptable. * active substance abuse, given that individuals who have active substance abuse pose a higher risk both to themselves and other members of the groups. * beginning new hypertension treatments in the past week or planning to begin new hypertension treatments in the next few weeks, or planning a major medical event in the next few weeks, which would interfere with accurately determining the effect of the intervention on impact in this study. * subjects who are pregnant will be not included in this study given that the risk-benefit ratio of this intervention may be higher than acceptable for these individuals due to the potential onset of non-study related gestational diabetes and/or gestational hypertension. determination of pregnancy status will be based upon subject self-report. * subjects who are not willing to participate in the intervention or attend the group visits.

Keywords: blood pressure, high